Datuk Shah Rukh Khan

Shahrukh Khan was swamped by thousands of fans as he received his controversial Datukship in Malacca. He looked resplendent in traditional costume as he received the award for services to the Malaccan film industry, stemming originally from a movie he made there in 2001. “He’s lovely and very charming, “said Angelica Das in the crowd, “Even my grandmother is in love with him.”

“It is a wonderful honour. It is very, very prestigious for me and… for all the people who act in films in my country,” said Shah Rukh, “When you are an actor, you truly believe that the language that you speak can be truly international and go across boundaries and bring hope especially in today’s time and age, when the world is full of strife.”

Shah Rukh is the first Indian to receive the award and he has promised to help to develop the local film industry. Malaysian film has a long and complex history with earlier Japanese influences being superseded by American and more recently Bollywood themes and structures. “There is a film I am planning to shoot some time in August and September and I will send a team to look around Malacca,” he said.

In a TV interview, SRK has also spoken out against those who orchestrated the attack on Mumbai. “Let me clarify this. I have read the holy Quran,” he stated, “It states that if you heal one man, you heal the whole of mankind and also that if you hurt one man, you hurt the whole of mankind. Nowhere in the Quran does it say that jihad will lead you to jannat (paradise).”

This is an important period for SRK with the release of his next big movie Rab Ne Bana De Jodi, released next Friday, which features a dream debut for new starlet Anushka Sharma. It’s a romantic feelgood movie — the type of film that SRK does best of all.